Returns

Creating a return

A return always starts from the order it came from.

1. Open the order, or go to Returns and start from there.
2. Press Take this back.
3. Choose the lines and quantities coming back. A line already on another return is not offered twice.
4. Say why: faulty, damaged on the way, not as described, we sent the wrong thing, no longer wanted, arrived too late, or something else.
5. Add what the customer said in their own words, which is what whoever opens the box will want.
6. Press Raise the return. You get an RMA reference the customer can quote.

Stock remains unchanged until the parcel arrives and its contents are inspected.

Accepting or refusing

Accept it or Refuse it record your answer to the request. Cancel this return is for one raised by mistake. None of them touches stock.

Receiving returned goods

1. Open the return.
2. Under The parcel arrived, say how many of each line are in the box.
3. Press Book it in.

This records the received items without changing stock. Availability is updated only after the condition of each item has been confirmed.

Inspection outcome

This is the moment the numbers change. For each item that arrived, choose one:

• Back on the shelf. On hand goes up and the item is available to sell again.
• Damaged. Recorded as written off. Stock does not go up.
• Held. Use when the condition is still under review. The item is accounted for and can be resolved later.

Add a note, then press Record it. A line that was never matched to anything in the catalogue is recorded without moving stock, and says so.

Recording a refund

Record the refund stores the amount and date. It does not move money: the refund itself is made where the payment was taken, in the shop, the marketplace or the payment provider. Nothing here can or should reach into that.

What happens next depends on the channel, and the return says which. Some channels are simply told. Shopify cannot be told - it records a refund only through a transaction against the order’s own gateway, which is a payment we never make on your behalf - so the return instead matches what you refunded in Shopify against what is recorded here, and settles by itself on the next sweep. Refund it there and this catches up within a couple of minutes; Check now asks straight away.

Three answers are worth recognising on that panel:

• Waiting for you - nothing has been refunded at the shop yet. Refund it there.
• Waiting for the payment provider - you have refunded, and the money has not completed. Do not refund again, or the customer is paid twice. It settles itself when the money lands.
• Needs someone to settle it - the shop has refunds that could each be this return and nothing there says which, or the amounts are split so that no single refund covers it. Nothing here will guess: open the order in the shop and decide.

A return is never recorded as settled against money another return has already claimed. Two returns on one order are each matched to their own refund or to neither.

Refunded at the shop, with no return here

The opposite case, and it is common: somebody refunds a customer in the shop without opening a return here. The money is gone, the goods are unaccounted for, and the returns screen would otherwise show nothing.

The bottom of the Returns screen lists those orders - what the shop says it refunded, minus what the returns here add up to. An order with no return at all is the obvious case; an order whose return does not cover the whole refund is the one worth reading, because it looks settled from either end.

Only orders whose stock left your shelf are listed. An order refunded before it shipped is a cancellation, and so is an order that was already refunded when the store was connected: nothing went out for it, so there is nothing to come back and a return would put stock on the shelf that never left.

It is a report and nothing more. No return is created for you: a refund is not a return - the goods may never come back - and inventing one would restock stock that is not on your shelf. If the goods are coming back, open the return from the order in the usual way.

Closing a return

Close this return when every received item has been accounted for. A return cannot be closed while an item is still waiting for inspection.

Return statuses

Status	Meaning
Asked for	Raised, not yet answered.
Accepted	You agreed to take it back.
Arrived	Something has been booked in.
Closed	Everything that arrived is accounted for.
Refused	You declined the request.
Cancelled	Raised by mistake, or withdrawn.

The Returns screen shows open ones by default. Show closed ones too includes the rest, and every return keeps the order it came from beside it.